Manugraph India - bets on new print sites

Sanjay Shah, the vice chairman and managing director of Manugraph India, says the post-Drupa sentiment is better. He said, “The response to Manugraph’s Ecoline at Drupa was more than we anticipated. Being a press which requires minimum floorspace and prints at 25,000 cph, it has its own demand in the market among the small to medium size newspapers.” He said, “Enquiries are underway for the product which we expect will translate into orders soon.”

Sanjay Shah, vice chairman and managing director of Manugraph India

In terms of big ticket orders in the hand, Dainik Bhaskar has installed the 8-tower 533 mm cut-off M360 press from Manugraph in Jaipur. Shah stated, “Manugraph and Dainik Bhaskar have a long standing business relationship over many decades. We are happy to install the 8-tower M360 press at their Jaipur plant, adding to the many MIL machines installed at various centres of DB in India.

When asked about the market reports that said Dainik Bhaskar is seeking 21 new towers pan-India up to March 2017, Shah stated, “In 2017, we look forward to making the business relationship with Dainik Bhaskar even stronger.”

Other than Dainik Bhaskar, Eenadu has completed its project at Adilabad with a 2 Hiline towers add-on to the old YR units. In addition, Amar Ujala is installing two new presses in Uttar Pradesh which is poll-bound in 2017 and therefore expecting a boom in newspaper outreach. Shah confirmed the news, “We have recently installed the Hiline six 4-Hi towers at Lucknow and the other is under production.”

The two media leaders in Kerala, Matrubhoomi and Malayala Manorama have emphasised their continuation in bolstering the publication print market. Malayala Manorama has been aggressively pursuing the modernisation of the print sites. The installation project began in 2011 with the most recent being installed in 2016.

Shah said, “The five Smartline machines are running well, and have been installed across multiple centres of Malayala Manorama. Smartline is India’s first double width 4x1 press manufactured, locally. We are glad to be in a position to offer the market a 4x1 press with so many home advantages, including a saving on foreign exchange, no expense on duty or shipping and easily available spare parts.” Shah, felt, “Like Malayala Manorama, we hope to see many more Indian newspapers take advantage of such value and technology innovation which is available, locally.

Matrubhumi has a plant in Kochi which has a six-tower Hiline press. This machine was assembled together in Kochi from two different press lines in 2013.

As per a statement issued earlier this year, Manugraph India’s printing presses have contributed Rs 238.77 cr to sales value of the company. According to the company’s auditors, this is 88.00% of the total sales for the year ending 31 March 2016.